Bookmarkable URLA model of clock originally known as ‘l’Emploi du Temps’, it was first made for Madame Geoffrin (1699-1777), a society hostess, famed for holding artistic and literary soirées. According to her will she kept the clock in her bedroom and admired it so much that she commissioned another version for Diderot. The reading figure symbolises the employment of time but may also reflect a contemporary portrait of Madame Geoffrin. The plinth was made by Joseph Baumhauer (died 1772) and the bronze figure and clock case were probably cast by the founder Edme Roy (master 1745) from a model by Laurent Guiard (1723-88).

Bookmarkable URLIn 1714 the French Academy offered a poetry prize on the subject of the vow made by Louis XIII in 1638 to re-decorate the Choir of Notre-Dame if a son was born to him (as indeed happened that year). The winner of the prize was the now forgotten abbé du Jarry, while the runner-up was the young Voltaire who subsequently ridiculed du Jarry’s work. This sculpture was the prize. It comprises allegorical figures of Religion (left), Piety (right), Fame and an angel. Fame trumpets the achievement, while the other figures hold medals bearing busts of Louis XIII and Louis XIV and images relating to the vow and to the Academy itself.

Bookmarkable URLThis grand wardrobe is similar to another in the Wallace Collection (F62) . The main purpose of the piece was for display, but it was also fitted with shelves for storage purposes. The figurative, gilt-bronze mounts on the centre of the doors represent Apollo and Daphne and Apollo flaying Marsyas, mythological stories derived from Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Boulle himself was a compulsive collector and owned a series of drawings after the Metamorphoses by Raphael, destroyed in his workshop fire of 1720. In a declaration of 1700 Boulle declared that he had nine wardrobes in his workshop, so it is likely that the production of such pieces was quite considerable. This wardrobe was once in the collection of the Duke of Buckingham at Stowe House. The interior was lined with peach blossom silk and fitted with gilt-bronze brackets and hooks to hold the clothes of Queen Victoria when she visited in 1845, three years before the 4th Marquess purchased the wardrobe.

Bookmarkable URLOne of the finest of Coques’s portraits, 'A Family Group in a Landscape' depicts a sophisticated ensemble of figures. The father of the family decorously holds his wife’s hand while indicating the return of his sons from the hunt, which until shortly before the date of this painting had been an exclusive privilege of the nobility. A sister carrying a basket of fruit, which may indicate her hopes for a fruitful marriage, accompanies the boys. The background appears to be by another hand. The picture belonged to Watteau’s friend, the dealer Jean de Julienne, and later to the dealer Le Brun. Highly prized in the nineteenth century, it passed through the collections of Lucien Bonaparte, William II of Holland and Théodore Patureau, at whose sale it was bought by the 4th Marquess of Hertford. Lord Hertford wrote to Mawson describing his purchase as ‘very pretty & very fine’.